When we decided to adopt a child and started to look around for a program to choose, the other option we seriously considered besides Ethiopia was Haiti.
The wait and cost involved in the adoption finally tipped the scale towards Ethiopia and with great sadness we left Haiti behind. Have we chosen Haiti, probably we would have been one of the parents still waiting to bring their children home in the middle of the chaos of the earthquake.
I completely understand the feelings of those desperate parents who want to take their children home no matter what, but I also think that now the best for the children is to stay in Haiti until things get better. Also, this is not a good time to start adopting children from Haiti.
One of the things you want to be sure about when you adopt a child is that all the information you get is correct and clear. The rights of a child are first.
The aftermath of the earthquake is the perfect ground for people with evil intentions. Children that still have parents or other relatives in Haiti who could take care of them are at risk of being taken away forever in not so clear adoptions.
If the government starts to make exceptions and let children get out of the country, soon information will be lost, families will be separated, and innocent Haitian children will be trafficked all over the world.
The situation in Haiti is desperate, but to understand what I’m talking about you have to put yourself in the shoes of the people that is living there.
Imagine that the country you are living in suffers a terrible earthquake. Your family gets separated and you can’t find your children, you don’t know if they are dead or alive and you try desperately to get reunited with them. But someone from abroad comes and starts picking up children from the streets and then takes them away from the country. Imagine that one of those children is your son, or your daughter. While you try to find him, he is already many miles away in a foreign land, all connections lost, forever. Even when both of you survived the catastrophe, you will never know it, you will never be together again. Would you like a government that allows that to happen?
We know it happened before and we know the consequences of that situation. We can’t let that happen again.
The first rule when you get lost is “stay put” and wait for someone to find you, the same rule applies here. Children have to stay in Haiti until we know really their situation, their identities, and until they can be found by relatives.
Now the priority is to meet the basic needs of children and adults in Haiti; food, shelter, safe water, and medical care. It is the people of that country who needs to decide when and how their children will leave Haiti. The only thing we can do now is provide help in Haiti.
Haiti is far from perfect, but is the country of those children and they should remain there until the nation can get reorganized and families get reunited.
That’s what I would like if I was living there with my children.

Human Predators Stalk Haiti’s Vulnerable Children – Time.com
Parents Tell of Children They Entrusted to Detained Americans – NY Times

Operation Babylift (Vietnam) – PBS
Groups Urge Caution As Americans Offer To Adopt Tsunami Orphans – Voice of America

AliciA